If I ever judged the UK by what I saw on TV when I lived in the US

[Tee2072]

Everyone in the UK would either speak with a Cockney or RP accent.

They would all either live in an over crowded terrace or a huge country estate.

All the schools would be crap.

The populace would spend their entire lives in pubs.

Now, I never believed any of that, being a relatively smart human being.

So am I being unreasonable to wonder how come I'm constantly battling US TV stereotypes here on MN?

It's a thread about many many many threads.

I would worry less about family like that. It is the random neighbour who is less careful about storage and/or prone to panicking. ..

The God/Jesus thing is very strange if you're not used to it.

You get 'God bless you all' and 'Jesus saves' signs at petrol stations etc.

Well, I also never fretted about the neighbours. I don't think I knew anyone who owned a gun when I was a kid.

The law enforcement types started with my generation, so most of my nieces and nephews friend's parents are in law enforcement, as it's my brothers/sisters/cousins who are involved. I certainly don't hear any of them, even the ones who aren't involved, talking about being worried about guns.

The thing I noticed most about this when I lived in the US is just how uninterested (and unaware) most people are of what goes on outside the US generally.

I'm not talking about the educated Americans, some of whom are better educated than most Brits, but ordinary people who haven't travelled. People are really quite ignorant (in the true sense of the word) about the world outside the US.

Britain has tons of ignorant, racist people who think anything "foreign" is a source of suspicion, Lord knows... I'm not letting us off the hook for this.

But in the US it seems almost institutionalised. I met otherwise fairly intelligent people all the time who thought that Britain was part of continental Europe, people who thought that London was in the US, etc etc. Masses and masses of people thought I was Australian. I may be wrong but I get the impression that the educational system there focuses almost exclusively on the US and teaches people very little of what happens outside.

Also you have to be relatively wealthy to be able to afford to travel outside the US (and to be fair a lot of people are stuck thousands of miles from a border) so foreign travel is less common. And there's almost no foreign news on the TV, except for either twee "heartwarming" stuff like Royal Weddings or disaster stuff like earthquakes, etc.

People also don't travel outside the US, quesadilla because most people get 2 weeks holiday a year. And that has to fit around schools and so on and so most people don't ever go anywhere on holiday, never mind somewhere that takes a plane.

It's one of the most bewildering things about the UK to me, actually, that holidays abroad and taking time off to take them and spending money on them is nearly seen as a right, not a privilege.

Tee yes, fair enough... I do understand that for a lot of Americans its simply not possible to travel.

But it does seem more institutionalised than that too. I got the impression that because of the American exceptionalism thing the shining city on the hill, the fact that America is seen not just as a country but as the best country and the country that rewrote the rulebook interest in other countries is sort of passively discouraged in a way. And that interest in "Old" Europe is seen as a bit retrograde.

Again, I may be wrong and I haven't been educated in the American school system but that's what it felt like. And for what its worth I feel like the average blue-collar Brit has a better grasp of geography/history of the rest of the world than their US counterpart.

Oh I'm not disagreeing with that.

Elementary school was 30 years ago, but it was mostly American history, as I recall. And a lot of states concentrate on state history.

I do see more people knowing what's going on over here, but that's thanks to the internet and 24 hour news channels and so on.

I think the most confusing of stereotypes are those owned (and waved around proudly) by the Canadians.

Polite to a fault, apologetic, outdoorsy, bilingual... but I heard a rumour that there might be a guy in the Canadian London that doesn't like trees

Honestly, though - Brits see us as unarmed Americans with health care, Americans see us as Brits on the wrong side of the ocean.

We are the most two-faced bunch you'll ever meet... the manners and apologies - you'll hear that all day long, but just under the surface, in the deep dark corners that the light never quite illuminates, we're jerks.

Oh... and we have a really screwed up sense of humour...

Haha bee that made me laugh.

I liked the partisan Canadian adverts, along the lines of 'don't drink that American Budweiser crap, drink labatts, patriots' or something.

Bee.

Hell, we have a beer called "Canadian" now owned by an American, or possibly German company

We are apologetically patriotic, but you won't often see tattooed flags, beavers or moose on our bodies. Many Canadians who are old enough to have formed political opinions are either staunch Monarchists or as anti-monarchy as they come (not much in between).

Funny thing, though, if you ask Canadians to say what a Canadian is, we'll fall back on regional stereotypes, too. Fishermen in the Maritimes, big business in Quebec and Ontario, farmers in the prairies, Oil in Alberta, hippies in British Columbia and the Innu in the north.

90% of the population lives within 200 km of the Canada/US border - as much as we try to maintain our identity, the American influence is strong. However, I live in a border town - across the river from the US. The difference between here and there - separated quite literally by 700 m of water - is so huge as to be difficult to believe. Appearance, accent, racial makeup or the communities... all of it. Going from here to downtown Detroit is like driving into a war zone - entire city blocks burnt out, graffiti and vandalism is rampant, people sleeping on street grates for warmth...

Scary, to be honest...

2 weeks vacation is the norm in Canada, too - and nothing for the first year of employment. I guess if it is all you get, you live with it.

However, one thing we do have going on right in Canada is maternal/parental leave. In total, there is a year's worth of leave to be used by one or both parents - so one can take 52 weeks, or they can both take time (it is divided into maternity and parental - so it can be used after adoption as well as birth). It is not full pay (works out to about 60 - 70% up to a maximum) but your position is protected while you are on leave.

That time is a blessing, to be sure.

Just used to it Kim. Of course that doesn't count national holidays.

Usually the longer you're with a company, the more leave you get.

We are entitled to 2 work weeks after a year with an employer, or 4% of annual pay in lieu of vacation time. If you don't get statutory holidays off (bank holidays), then you get extra pay for some of them - others are literally bank holidays, like Remembrance Day, when the banks and government offices are closed and there is no postal service but it is business as usual for everyone else.

I guess if you have never had anything different, then 2 weeks is plenty. Many places don't even have that protection.

Tee, GFA or Staples?

I also get plenty of Americans mistaking me for an Australian, South African or Irishwoman. The only demographic who scores 100% correct on this are NYC cabbies, especially those who hail from Bangladesh, India or Pakistan.

There's 2 high schools in Westport? Since when?

Staples. It was the only one 25 years ago! And I only went through junior year when I more or less dropped out and then went to boarding school for 2 years.

There are many more public holidays in the US. I added up those, plus the 'personal days' my US colleagues could take and it almost adds up to the same as our holiday and bank holiday total. Not quite, but almost.

I am always astounded that americans and canadians get so little leave compared to us lot. The least I have got is 23 days plus 8 days bank holidays. I now get 30 days, plus the bank holidays, plus the queens birthday and christmas eve off . Takes the piss really.

Do you have the same number of national holidays?

Tee, GFA is Greens Farms Academy, the private school in town.

Staples is so huge these days, it looks like an airport terminal.

Americans don't know where Wales is (none of the ones I've met have anyway)
Driving long distances is totally normal (I can see why, lovely long and straight roads)
Religion is something openly talked about and part of normal day to day life.
Most seem to love Tony Blair
Say excuse me when not actually physically close to you - that almost gave me a complex on one holiday!
Outrageously little holiday allowance/maternity leave

I find the "Americans don't do irony" stereotype so stupid given some of the tv programmes that have come out of America.

stop I am 99% sure GFA did not go through high school when I lived there. And I think it was tiny. I have vague memories of girls in uniform downtown after school, but not many of them!

I take it back, they did. I really was only barely aware it even existed when I lived there.

Private employers and non-federal public employers in the US are not required to observe the national holidays, and many do not observe all of them.